1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a probe set derived from an infectious etiologic microorganism, which is useful for detection and identification of a causative microorganism of an infectious disease, and a probe immobilized carrier having the probe immobilized thereon. The present invention further relates to a method for detecting an infectious etiologic microorganism gene using the probe set. The present invention furthermore relates to a primer set for effectively amplifying in advance nucleic acids in a specimen used for the detection method.
2. Description of the Related Art
Reagents and methods for detecting rapidly and reliably a pathogenic fungus in a specimen have been conventionally suggested. For example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. H08-089254 discloses an oligonucleotide comprising a specific base sequence, usable as a probe and a primer, for detecting an etiologic microorganism of candidiasis and aspergillosis, and a method for detecting a target microorganism using the same. Further, the same patent document discloses a primer set for amplifying a plurality of target microorganisms simultaneously by PCR. Moreover, it discloses that, using the primer set, a plurality of target fungi in the specimen are amplified by PCR, and then a sequence part specific to each fungus is detected by hybridization assay using a probe specific to each fungus to identify the species of fungus in the specimen.
On the other hand, as a method for simultaneously detecting oligonucleotides comprising a plurality of different base sequences, known is a method using a probe array wherein a probe having a sequence complementary to each of the base sequence is distantly immobilized on a solid phase (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2004-313181).